I was thinking about the squeeze page process and the two main ways I’d seen used when trying to build opt-in lists. The usual methods I’d seen were those shown in the flowchart below:

This isn’t necessarily a diagram for the flowchart purist – the exit paths from each decision diamond should be labelled and I’ve used boxes to make things a bit clearer on-screen.

Normally, you’d expect some sort of “bribe” in the form of a free information (a download or access to a video, for example). Although I have seen a squeeze page with very little on it apart from a headline stating something along the lines of “Most Of What You Thought You Knew About xyz Is Wrong”. In which case, I guess the “bribe” is the unstated promise that you’ll get your curiousity satisfied if you part with your name and email.

Whatever the case, it seemed obvious to me at the time that the right-hand, Squeeze Page option might have something of an advantage because the visitor only had two options (opt in or clear off). In other words, less to distract them from what you really want them to do.

On the other hand, having a landing page that contained content as well as the opt-in, would probably have an SEO advantage.

In short, I’d expect the squeeze page to get better conversions, but you’d have to pay to get traffic. And the content page would get free organic (search results) traffic but you’d need a lot more of it if you were to achieve the same volume of opt-ins.

Enter The Membership Model

Now hopefully you’ll have stuck with me beyond the groundwork above, because recently I was wondering about the various ways in which you could use membership sites, other than the obvious. It occurred to me that the purpose of any membership software or plugin is to control access to web pages. Those pages could contain information or download links, but to get to them a visitor would need to register – and then you’d capture their (opt-in) details.

The Best Of Both Worlds?

So if I use a membership plugin to a WordPress blog, could I use the unprotected content to attract visitors and give them a more compelling reason to part with their details than the offer of an unseen PDF download or video? Would this prove to be more efficient than either of the sub-processes maped out above?

There’s only one way to get a better idea of what works and that’s to set up a real-world experiment. Over the next few weeks, I’m going to set up some tests in different niches and I’ll report the results back here.

If you’ve got any thoughts about this subject, then I’d love to hear them.

For example, you could be running a free (to registered members) Publisher type site, which includes downloadable products that can be purchased by members.

The models do not have to be different, either. You could combine a free Publisher membership (let’s call it “Silver Membership”) giving access to basic content.  Then alongside this, you could run a paid-for “Gold membership” which provides premium content.

The combinations are endless and only limited by your imagination.

This is a great way for a coach to manage a small number of exclusive clients.

You assign each client to their own unique area within your membership site plus access to any shared resources.

When set up correctly, no individual client is able to access any other client’s area so that confidentiality is ensured.

Because of the hands-on nature of this type of membership, a practical limit is probably around a dozen clients. Points to consider when setting a limit on client numbers are:

• how responsive will you need to be
• how much time will each client need from you during a given period

In this model, members can share ideas, information and products within an exclusive, protected area.

Your community members are able to share information and ideas and get queries answered within an area that is closed to non-members. Membership is normally free (or very inexpensive) because the objective is to grow a community of like-minded people.

If you want to monetise the site, then the best option is probably Google Adsense or other paid-for advertising.

This is an innovative way of managing remote teams without the complication or expense of specialised on-line project management applications.

You first set up membership levels to represent the various teams within the project. You can then assign individual project resources (i.e. team members) to one or more teams.

The members of each of those teams then has access to its own area within your project’s site as well as any shared common resources.

To facilitate an overall view of project progress, you give your project co-ordinator access to all teams’ areas. This allows the co-ordinator to:

• consolidate team reports for upward reporting to the project manager (PM)
• add deliverables, tasks and directions to teams’ membership areas under the control of the PM

Another innovative way of using the membership principle. This model employs download pages that are restricted to suitably qualified members/customers.

If you are delivering downloadable products to your customers, then up to now you’ve had the choice of using:

• third party services (such as e-junkie)
• third party download management software
• your own unprotected download links

Each of the above may be appropriate under certain circumstances, but third party services will cost you an ongoing monthly fee, while the software option can be tricky to set up and time consuming to maintain. Your own unprotected download links are very simple to set up, but they can cost you a lot of lost income because of digital theft.

If you have the right membership software – like WishList Member – you can add protected pages to your site and embed the download links in those. It is also possible to place time limits on the download links to prevent page address sharing.

In this model, you move your customers through a set of different modules as they progress through your course.

This model differs from the Micro-Continuity model because you close down access to earlier modules as customers move onto the next module in the series.

You can also include tests between each module to make sure that the material is being absorbed.

Courses typically have a fixed end and this is great for customer retention.

This model allows you to deliver course-type material to your subscribers at suitable intervals (such as monthly).

As subscribers move from month to month, you give them access to successive parts of your course, while allowing them to still access earlier parts.

It’s a great model for customer retention because there is a fixed end in sight.

This model gets its nickname from the fact that your subscriber receives a fresh package of content each month (or other specified period).

That package is only accessible during the month, after which it is supplanted by the next package. If customers want to get earlier packages, then they have to buy them separately.

This model normally has no predefined end point, so provided you can keep your customers by consistently delivering quality, in-demand products, then the residual income is likely to build quite strongly.